The inspection took place on 23 August 2018, and was announced; we gave the provider 48 hours’ notice of the inspection to ensure that the registered manager was available for us to speak with. The service was last inspected in June 2017, and was rated Requires Improvement; improvements were required in the way the provider managed and audited medicines. We asked the provider to send us an action plan setting out what they would do to address this. At this inspection we found that the service had addressed these concerns, and is now rated good.

This service is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own houses and flats and specialist housing. It provides a service to older adults and younger disabled adults in the Rotherham, Doncaster, Barnsley and Wakefield areas. At the time of the inspection they were providing support to over 250 people.

The service had a registered manager in post at the time of our inspection. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

People’s privacy and dignity was upheld, and the provider monitored this through a series of spot checks on care visits. People told us they found staff to have a warm and caring approach when carrying out care visits.

Medicines were managed safely and staff had received appropriate training in this area.

Risks were safely managed, and the provider had appropriate arrangements in place to respond to any safeguarding concerns.

People’s care was regularly reviewed to ensure it met their needs, and changes were made where people required it so that they remained in as good health as possible.

The provider managed complaints well, and had systems in place to ensure it could learn from complaints where appropriate.

The provider had suitable arrangements in place for obtaining and acting in accordance with people’s consent. Where people lacked the mental capacity to give consent to their care, the provider had reached best interest decisions.

People’s nutrition and hydration was well managed, and staff had received a good standard of training

The provider had effective audit systems so that it could monitor and improve the care provided.

Staff told us they received a good level of support from managers within the service.

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We inspected Mears Care Rotherham on 16 June 2017. The inspection was announced in accordance with our methodology for inspecting domiciliary care services. The provider was given 48 hours notice of the inspection. This was the first inspection of the service at this location.

Mears Care Rotherham provides personal care to people living in their own homes, operating in Rotherham, Barnsley, Doncaster and Wakefield. The service had a registered manager. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

People using the service, and those who were important to them, were involved in planning their care. People told us that the staff were caring in their approach. People were treated with respect and their privacy, dignity and independence were protected.

Care staff were trained in protecting people from harm, and the provider had appropriate systems in place for addressing safeguarding concerns

The registered provider used robust systems to help ensure care staff were only employed if they were suitable and safe to work in people’s homes.

The provider had taken steps to improve how it managed medication, however, we found there were still shortfalls in relation to this, including a lack of documentation when medicines were administered.

The registered manager was knowledgeable about the Mental Capacity Act 2005, and its Code of Practice. They knew how to ensure that the rights of people who were not able to make or to communicate their own decisions were protected.

There were good systems in place to ensure that people received support from staff who had the training and skills to provide the care they needed.

People agreed to the support they received and were involved in reviewing their care to ensure it continued to meet their needs.

People knew how they could raise a concern about the service they received, and where complaints had been received, the provider managed this appropriately.

The registered manager had systems in place to monitor the quality of the service provided. People using the service and their families were asked for their views.

We found that while various aspects of the service were audited, the audits were not always sufficiently robust to identify shortfalls.